The boss took Mu Ke away, and Mu Sicheng woke up.
He lazily leaned back in Bai Liu's chair and picked up the coat Bai Liu had given him. Originally, Mu Sicheng had wanted to strongly oppose Bai Liu's participation in the league, but he quickly realized that Bai Liu was determined. Considering Bai Liu's personality, Mu Sicheng knew his resolve wouldn't be easily shaken.
Mu Sicheng had watched coldly as Bai Liu brought Mu Ke onto his "ship." After realizing he couldn't change Bai Liu's mind, he fell asleep. All he could do was seriously tell Bai Liu that he wouldn't foolishly join him in such a dangerous league.
However, the coat Bai Liu had placed over him softened Mu Sicheng's tone.
"How did you manage to trick that little beauty onto your damn boat?"
"You called Mu Ke a 'little beauty.' Are you gay?" Bai Liu glanced at Mu Sicheng. "Is Mu Ke your type?"
Mu Sicheng immediately choked. "I'm straight! Don't you understand sarcasm?!"
Bai Liu nodded casually. "I understand. Judging from your expression, do you have something you want to tell me?"
Before Mu Sicheng could speak, Bai Liu pulled over a chair and sat opposite him. Although Bai Liu looked relaxed, he carried a natural sense of oppression. Mu Sicheng had been slouching lazily, but now he couldn't help sitting up straight.
Bai Liu looked directly at him. "I assume you want to tell me that you'll never participate in this league."
"Can you give me a reason to convince me?" Bai Liu leaned back against the desk and tapped his fingers lightly. "Why are you unwilling to join this competition?"
"The mortality rate is high. The risk is high. We don't have enough people. We don't have enough instances cleared." Mu Sicheng listed them one by one. "Those are all problems."
"You can leave all that to me as long as you participate," Bai Liu replied calmly. "Do you have any other concerns?"
Mu Sicheng almost laughed at Bai Liu's composed expression.
Before the previous instance, he might have been fooled. But now he understood Bai Liu clearly—this man had a gambler's nature.
As long as the potential profit was high enough, Bai Liu would dare to try it, even if the success rate was low.
"Those are my main concerns," Mu Sicheng said seriously. "Bai Liu, the league isn't a joke. The player death rate is extremely high. There's no need to give up your real life for this game. The game can bring benefits, but you can earn points steadily with your strength. That's safer. No matter what, you should leave yourself a way out in real life…"
"Real life?" Bai Liu repeated softly.
After letting Mu Sicheng finish, Bai Liu asked a seemingly unrelated question. "What do you think about the single-player game Mu Ke just played?"
Mu Sicheng was startled. He hadn't expected that topic shift. He had been sleepy earlier but had still listened to their discussion.
The last game Mu Ke cleared was called Day of Leaving School. It had a Japanese-style campus setting. What caught Mu Sicheng's attention wasn't the content itself but one detail—
Mu Ke said the school in the game had a real-life prototype: the private high school he had attended in Japan. The school had been rumored to be haunted after a girl committed suicide by jumping from a building, and students had died in strange ways afterward.
Except for Mu Ke, everyone in his dormitory had died in bizarre accidents. That was why Mu Ke had confused the game with reality and even manifested physical injuries. The in-game high school was exactly the same as his real one.
It was similar to Bai Liu's experience. The prototype of Exploding Last Train was the actual train explosion in Mirror City that Bai Liu had once experienced.
Mu Sicheng was silent for a few seconds. "I don't think it's a coincidence. That's two games in a row with real-life prototypes."
"Yes," Bai Liu agreed. "That's what I think too."
He pulled out a piece of paper from his desk.
"I've come up with three possible explanations."
Bai Liu had a habit of writing things down, especially since memories could be tampered with. Specific "banned" information might disappear, so he only wrote key phrases.
He turned the paper toward Mu Sicheng.
"I believe many game instances are based on reality. Some people recognize the prototype; others don't. For example, you and I knew the bombing case because we're from Mirror City. Puppet Zhang didn't. Similarly, Mu Ke recognized the haunted Japanese school, but we didn't."
"The key question is: how does the game choose these real-life prototypes?"
Bai Liu wrote: Scene Selection.
"The first possibility is random selection of real-life events. But the bombing and the haunted school were both tragic and horrific. The selection is clearly biased toward disasters. So pure randomness seems unlikely."
He wrote: Source of Inspiration.
"The second possibility is that the game selects tragedies or locations players have personally experienced. The system can delete memories—so perhaps it can also read them. It may use players' memories as references to construct the game."
"That would make immersion easier. For example, the train scene at the end of the second instance was exactly like my memory. It blurred the line between illusion and reality."
Mu Sicheng crossed his arms thoughtfully. "The second explanation sounds more reasonable. What's the third?"
"There's a major flaw in the second theory," Bai Liu said calmly. "The timeline doesn't match."
He looked directly at Mu Sicheng. "When did Exploding Last Train first appear in the game?"
Mu Sicheng frowned. "A long time ago. It existed when I first entered."
"Correct," Bai Liu said. "But the Mirror City bombing happened this year. That means Exploding Last Train existed before the real bombing."
He paused.
"That means we made a mistake about the direction of the prototype."
"It's not that Exploding Last Train was based on the Mirror City bombing."
"It's that the Mirror City bombing was based on Exploding Last Train."
He wrote two more words: Testing Phase.
Mu Sicheng felt as if ice water had been poured over him. His hands trembled. "That's impossible…"
Bai Liu remained calm. "Before a game is officially released, there's usually a beta version—a limited public test. If developers are satisfied with player feedback, they release the official version to everyone."
Bai Liu raised his eyes.
"My third possibility is that the game and our reality are the beta version and official version of the same system."
"The game tests selected players in certain instances. If the system is satisfied with our performance, it releases the corresponding 'instance' into reality—open to everyone."
"For example, Exploding Last Train was released into reality as the Mirror City bombing. Day of Leaving School was released as a real haunted high school. They're simply two manifestations of the same horror game."
He looked at Mu Sicheng without emotion.
"Our world isn't safe. The official version of these horror games can be released into our reality at any time."
"If that's true, then the real life you're trying to protect is no different from living inside the game."
"So Mu Sicheng, I don't think you need to reject the competition for the sake of your so-called real life."
"Because the reality we live in is nothing more than a game competition you can't see."